I walked into Nordstrom Rack on Wednesday, realizing as I walked that I was literally a walking Rack.

I was currently wearing the following that had been bought at Nordstrom Rack or HauteLook:
– Shirt
– Shoes
– Sports Bra
– Pants
– Sunglasses
– Purse

Literally the only things I had on or with me that I hadn’t bought from Rack/HauteLook were:
– Underwear
– Socks
– My children

But though I go to them for nearly my entire wardrobe, it’s the things I don’t purchase that give me the most joy.

Like, for instance, did you know that you can buy partial legs with your pumps now?

It’s as if they wanted to repurpose the Wicked Witch of the East’s shoes and what was left of her body after that house dropped on her.

Although personally, I’d be much more likely to wear the original.

It’s just less grotesque to wear someone else’s legs when they’re covered in black and white stripes, don’t you agree?

If you’re not ready to wear someone else’s calves, though, how about stitching tiny pairs of underwear all over your jeans?

They’re almost as if the witch who met Hansel and Gretel liked to add patches to her clothes to commemorate all the gingham-clad children she’d stuffed into her oven.

I mean just think – originally, those jeans looked like this.

Clearly, baking children improves denim choices.

But you know what else improves denim? Three words: Ruffles, Suspenders, and Grommets. Oh and a tube top.

If you’ve always wondered why the Red Cross was repeatedly asking you to come in and donate platelets, it’s because they had a quota from the fashion world.

“Feel like the life’s been drained out of you? For just $110, wear other people’s life blood – guaranteed to perk you up and make you feel like you’d just been at the receiving end of a giraffe birthing process.”

(As an aside, I refused to follow the whole April the Giraffe drama, but wouldn’t that social media hussy know just when to start giving birth so that the whole world was playing on their phones while their kids watched Saturday morning cartoons. I had no idea so much afterbirth could come out of one being. And that placenta could’ve fed a hippy army for a year.)

If you were to find yourself at the receiving end of a giraffe placenta, may I suggest a garbage bag jumpsuit.

You can just slip out of the jumpsuit, tie that baby up in it, and voila – immediate HAZMAT situation contained.

Do you have some denim cloth napkins left over from 1984? Have you considered stitching them onto your favorite black sweater? If not, why not?

I have trouble keeping Kleenex around – especially in the car. They seem to disappear constantly, and I’m left having just sneezed all over my steering wheel and nothing to sop up the mess.

But fashion has come to save the day.

Now, with built in BOOB TISSUES!! They can reach your nose, reach your steering wheel, reach your kid’s grubby cheeks in the backseat, and cover up those embarrassing breastfeeding mom leaks.

My Great-Grandmother always kept three Kleenexes in her bra for emergencies (tucked in next to that $5 bill) – she would have TOTALLY understood this dress.

But if your problem is that your boobs have been naughty and you need to put them in time out, this dress is here for you. Guaranteed to not allow your boobs – or your arms – to move an inch.

Hey Mom – can you reach the cereal on the top shelf?
No, no I actually cannot.

And finally. If your teenage son is a little bit goth and a little bit country and just CANNOT hurry up and decide what to wear to school tomorrow, I have found his token look. His black lipstick and rebel flag trucker hat will BOTH work perfectly with it.

New Year’s Eve is a fashion must, especially when you’re a mom who has no plans because her husband is attending a College Football Playoff Game.

You better look good for those kids covered in Christmas Candy Dust, ya know?

(For the record I could have absolutely flaunted my fashion fantasticness at said College Football Playoff Game, but I politely turned down the offer. My willingness to go to football while having a complete lack of interest does have a price ceiling, and certain seats are just too expensive for my butt to rest while I stare listlessly at my phone begging the end of the fourth quarter to arrive. Instead, my Dad will come over and watch the game “with me” while I stare listlessly at my phone and the children run magical circles of melted-chocolate-powered-energy around both of us.)

So, fashion. As usual, I turned to HauteLook to dress me for this momentous occasion.

And, as usual, I found what I was looking for – and a whole lot more. So I brought a few things for you to wear, as well.

Perhaps you’re looking for the perfect spot to wear on New Year’s Eve.

No, not the perfect spot to wear something – the perfect spot to wear.

If you don’t have time to order, this is a great craft to let those kids you have help you with. Just find a completely sheer shirt that you used to have use for in some prior exciting life,

Then get your kids to cut out a giant circle out of white construction paper, use a bit of glue, and BOOM!! Fashion.

Alternately, this is a great costume for a Dr. Seuss party.

I will not eat it in a pot,I will not eat it in a spot.

And then, change into this outfit and…

I will not eat it in suspendered culottes.

But really, nothing says “I’m partying hard on New Year’s Eve” like the back of your pants resembling the front of a 1991 seriously Long Butted pair of dress pants.

Would you rather distract everyone waiting for the ball to drop with your own balls? Then this next shirt’ll do it. Especially if you bling it up a little with your daughter’s craft set and make every one of these pom-poms a tiny spinning disco ball.

Okay, okay I get it. You’re not all staying at home with young children for New Year’s. (Chris promises to be back well in time to kiss me at midnight, so Alabama better not go into overtime.) If you want to be a little fancier than I plan on being, I assume this is what all the young people are wearing these days.

I am not, however, appreciative of them making the off-brand version of “Rihanna” out of my name.

Need to imply a pop star’s name without actually using it?Just stick a Rach on it!

I know that cold shoulder shirts are all the rage this year – either to hate or to love, depending on your personal beliefs.

But how do we feel about cold armpit shirts?

It’s not really an issue I was ready to face as a human being. How about you?

Thanks to the cold shoulder craze, we have all sorts of body parts that are jealously wanting to get a bit chilly. Let’s do a quick bullet list.

We have the Cold Clavicle Sweatshirt, perfect for moms who want their sweats and their sexy at the same time…

The Cold shoulder / arm / midriff and…

back shirt. How DO these women wear a bra?

The cold “Let’s Put a Tassle on it” shirt,

The cold “Please Don’t Choke Me” shirt,

(In case you wanted to understand how it was connected…I cannot imagine how constrictive this shirt feels.)

The Cold Curtain Shirt,

The cold shoulder AND forearm sweater,

The “Stripes O’ Cold” Dress,

The Cold Hearted shirt,

And, my favorite cold product of all time,

The Cold Lower Thigh Denim Dress.

It’s as if someone said, “This dress is covering too much. Like nearly every inch of her. We need more skin.”

And in response, one of the designers, strung out on a bad cocktail of crack cocaine and French Fashion Education, said “I know JUST the skin to show!”

Okay. Let’s get back to New Year’s Eve.

If you happen to be celebrating New Year’s Eve 1988, may I suggest this beauty.

It makes me miss my Colors of Benetton Barbie something fierce.

And this one..I don’t even understand where and when and how and who…but it’s 68% off, y’all!!

You are looking at Seven Hundred and Forty Five Dollars and Three Cents of free Shop Top!

My favorite part of this outfit, though, was the clearly photoshopped Thigh Gap. No human in the world’s body curves to make a perfect teaspoon.

It’s beautiful outside (at least if you live in Alabama) and definitely the season to start thinking about new wardrobes and shorts and tank tops and all the summer things!

(Except bathing suits. They are never to be thought about. Or tried on in dressing rooms with rigged mirrors that make one look 100 pounds heavier. Swimsuits are a conspiratorial plot against female humanity.)

Anyway.

Shopping.

As usual, I have been doing all my shopping at HauteLook. They have fabulous prints! And adorable pieces! And….these?

What is happening. Is this Jasmine-Chic with a bit of I Dream of Jeannie thrown in? And is that flimsy kitchen valance the only thing that is keeping the world from seeing her goods?

It kind of looks like a butt handkerchief. And I sincerely hope she doesn’t sneeze.

But wait! There’s more! A matching shirt, in fact! And in this picture, it appears that she loaned her buttkerchief to someone else!

PLEASE do not miss that this is 64% off and yet, still $109.97. Because apparently, exceptionally weird people are also loaded.

But if you just love the knee-length jams look but would prefer a bit more coverage, well there’s this.

If there’s ever a mash-up movie called 50 Shades of Twilight, I’m pretty sure this will be in wardrobe.

This one, though. I can just hear CFDA Lifetime Achievement Award Winner Michael Kors saying “We NEVER put fringe there, ladies. Do you realize what that LOOKS like??”

No. Instead, we sew an oversized shirt from 1986 to a few thrown-together graduation tassels and call it a dress.

Or we get really excited with our tassels and sheer shirts and make our 24-inch-waisted model look like she’s 48 hours postpartum.

(And yes. It’s just as frightening from the back. Spiderman gone very, very awry.)

A post-childbirth collection is not complete without the “I just stopped nursing and my boobs turned into empty grocery sacks” corset, though.

And what would the collection be without a “I got up to change the baby’s diaper in the middle of the night and somehow got in a fight with their onesie and the onesie won” pants?

(Or from the back, it’s the “My baby has gotten too long for their onesie so I just unbutton it and let it hang like inverted chaps” look.)

Then there’s the “My baby is exhausting me so thoroughly that even my boobs are asleep” shirt.

And there’s always the “My baby crapped their pants and their bed and their walls and their rug and their ceiling and the top shelf of their closet and I need a HAZMAT suit to enter the room” wardrobial need.

But let’s move away from parenthood. Because childbearing or not, NO women want to be seen looking like a walking menstruation.

I MEAN. What Martian created that design and said, “yeah! Let’s go with that!”

Then again, maybe it was this guy.

That’s right. Those flannel shorts come with built in compression leggings. Because if you’re going to wear flannel shorts, you don’t want to sacrifice circulation to do it.

Speaking of flannel.

Have you ever wondered what happened to all your grunge friends from the 90s? The ones you listened to Nirvana CDs with while sitting on your bean bag in the basement?

Well, I’m here to tell you exactly where they are.

They got sewed into this skirt.

But this skirt is even more special than just the resting place for all your high school friends. It’s Foo Fighters in the Front, Scarlett O’Hara in the back.

A FLANNEL BUSTLE, y’all.

They also want you to know that just because you’re a homeschool mom…

doesn’t mean you can’t show off your sexy shoulder blades.

I totally want to wear that to my next homeschool meeting.

But back to flannel for a hot minute. We’ve all had that moment where we’ve been all like “I really want to jump out of an airplane but I want to express my style while I do it. Oh – and I need some good pockets because I can’t jump without my cell phone!” Right? Well. Do I have a solution for you.

She’s so ready for whatever life throws at her. Including bird poop on the way down.

And then the feeling of “I want to reclaim my youth with a pair of Birks, but I also want to reminisce about the orange shag carpet that was in my bedroom.”

Great news! You can do both at once!!

I know. This really deserves a closer look.

Yup. It’s raw hamburger meat on a shoe.

But. Of course HauteLook also offers many basics. Wardrobe staples. Things that every girl needs. Like a plain white tee.

Huh.

That’s funny.

I wonder why it describes it as a “Print” Tee?

I should turn it around and see the back.

Because nothing says “I’m worth it and you should really woo me” like YELLING IT FROM YOUR BUTT.

Also, they have this lovely, simple, black shirt.

…that has quite a mouthful to say from the rear view.

Voice Mail. SEND THE PAST TO VOICE MAIL. WHO still talks about voice mail?!

I mean. If I’m going to be passive-aggressive behind my back, I at least want to mute my past’s text messages.